


as you wish

by rhapsodyinpink



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/M, it's a princess bride fever dream sick fic, plance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-07
Updated: 2018-06-07
Packaged: 2019-05-19 11:19:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14872790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rhapsodyinpink/pseuds/rhapsodyinpink
Summary: Pidge has a fever dream that leads her, Lance and the other paladins right into the world of The Princess Bride.





	as you wish

**Author's Note:**

> a tiny little oneshot written for the plance zine! enjoy :)

Everyone in the castle knows it’s a bad idea to bother Pidge when she has a cold. 

When she’s three layers deep into her blankets, disturbing her recovery means dealing with a Pidge who is a deadly combination of hangry, tired, and mean. 

Lance knows the risk. But he doesn’t care. His girlfriend needs someone to take care of her. 

After convincing Hunk to make a special bowl of soup for her, he strides down the hallway and stops in front of her door, ignoring the DO NOT DISTURB sign in bold red letters hanging on it.  

“Babe, it’s me,” he calls through the door as he gently knocks. “Can I come in?”

Silence.

Lance knocks again, harder this time, until he hears an irritated moan, which he decides to take as a yes. 

“I come bearing gifts,” he announces as he strides through the door. 

Pidge glares at him from within her blanket burrito in the middle of the bed. He resists telling her that she looks a lot like an angry cat.

She turns her blazing eyes to the soup, which she regards with suspicion. 

“Did you make that?” she croaks. “I don’t want it if you did. You can’t cook for shit.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Captain Hangry,” he replies, laughing. “It was Hunk.” 

As he offers up a spoonful of soup to her mouth, her face softens. “Sorry. I’m being mean.” 

He tousles her hair and smiles. “It’s okay. Wanna watch a movie? Anything you want.” 

Pidge considers. “Can we watch The Princess Bride?” she says. 

Lance smiles. “As you wish,” he replies, and she presses cracked lips against his cheek. 

It’s a sappy sincerity reserved only for their private moments— if Hunk or Keith were to ever overhear them, they know that neither of them would never hear the end of it.

But nobody has to know.

* * *

The film is an old favorite for both of them, and they quote the best lines at each other as they’re said on screen. Lance leans in to kiss Pidge every time Westley kisses Buttercup.

“Stop, you’re gonna make yourself sick,” Pidge protests. 

Lance waggles his eyebrows. “What if that’s what I want? I could use a little more TLC.”

“So what you’re saying is that you’re trying to get sick on purpose because you want  _ me  _ to get you soup and kiss your forehead and wrap you up in blankets?”

“ _ Exactamente _ .”

“You’re gross.” 

“Says the girl with snot dripping down her nose.” 

They play fight a little, rolling around the sheets until Pidge runs out of energy, and before she knows it, she starts drifting to sleep as the movie continues to play on. 

* * *

Pidge wakes up with a start.

Oddly, she feels well, but something feels... _ off _ . Her body feels heavy weighed down. 

She swings her legs out of bed to get up, and that’s when she realizes it: she’s wearing a long fancy dress.

A ballgown, to be exact— and much more suited to a princess than a paladin.

It’s something Allura would wear to a diplomatic soiree, not something Pidge would ever choose to wear, even for a fancy occasion. 

And: it’s red. 

Red is not a color that Katherine Pidge Holt would ever wear. 

Even worse: Lance is nowhere to be seen. 

Nothing about this situation makes sense.

Still, she has to figure out what to do. 

Pidge looks around and takes stock of her surroundings. From the looks of it, she is inside an ornately decorated bedroom within some sort of European styled castle— nothing at all like the Castle of Lions. 

She walks around and takes stock of the room. It’s plush and ostentatious, oozing with pretension and Galra purple accents everywhere that set her on edge. 

Someone pounds on the door.  

Pidge immediately takes a cautious fighting stance, even though she has no weapons to speak of and it’s obvious that her lion is nowhere to be seen. 

It’s unclear whether she’s in some sort of simulation or if this is a mind game the Galra are playing, but she can never be too cautious. 

And then the unmistakably dulcet tones of none other than Lotor echo through the door.

“Buttercup, darling, have you made progress on the vows?” 

Pidge stares as Lotor strides in, dressed like some sort of fairytale prince and followed by several lackeys pressed close to his side who don’t even look at her. 

“Lotor? Why are you dressed like that?” 

He cocks his head and frowns. “Lotor? Is that some sort of pet name you’ve come up with? I don’t like it.” 

“What?”

“I know you are but a simple uneducated country girl, Buttercup, but surely you have not forgotten that I am the leader of your kingdom and that my name is Prince Humperdinck.”

“Lotor, I don’t know if this is some sort of trick you’re playing, but it’s not funny— ”

She stops and frowns. _Wait._ _Buttercup? Prince Humperdinck? Am I in the movie? But— how?_

Lotor raises a haughty eyebrow. 

“This behavior is highly unbecoming of my future queen. You must not behave this way at our wedding tomorrow.” 

“I am NOT marrying you!”

“Unfortunately, my dear Buttercup, you do not have a say in this decision.” 

He doesn’t even look twice as he turns around and strides out of the room.

Pidge rubs her temples. She needs to figure out how to get out of this dream simulation and back to the normal world, but her head is beginning to throb and the room is spinning. 

The last coherent thought she has before everything fades to black is that she needs to find Lance. 

* * *

When the world comes back into focus, Pidge is in a meadow on the top of a cliff somewhere, tied up and sitting on a rock facing Hunk and Shiro, while Keith is engaged in a duel a few yards away with a man in a mask, who Pidge assumes is the Dread Pirate Roberts.

“Let me guess,” she says. “Vizzini and Fezzik.” 

Hunk raises an eyebrow. “How do you know our names?”

“Because none of this is real,” she replies. “We’re in a movie and you’re the characters. Or a dream. Or something. I’m not exactly sure yet. The scenes aren’t exactly matching up to how they’re supposed to be.”

Hunk turns to Shiro. “Do you know anything about this?” 

Shiro shakes his head as Keith disarms his opponent. Pidge’s eyes widen as the man falls to the ground and his mask comes off— it’s Lance. 

Of course. If she’s Buttercup, then he’s Westley. 

She’s beginning to formulate a theory: if she’s dreaming, then she can control the sequence of events. And if she can control the sequence of events, she can make this movie go much, much faster...and then she can get back to the Castle of Lions, cuddling with her boyfriend and hopefully feeling much better than she is right now.

“You there! Are you the Dread Pirate Roberts?” she calls. 

Lance’s brows furrow as they make eye contact. “Depends on who’s asking.”

Pidge whips her head back to Hunk.

“Please untie me.” 

He shakes his head. “I’m sorry, but I can’t do that.” 

She turns to Shiro. “Can you please untie me, Fezzik?” 

He looks uncertain. “I’m not sure I can…” 

Keith walks towards them, carrying both his sword and Lance’s. 

“Let her go. I have both swords I needed to complete the mission. We can just tell Humperdinck she died of starvation or something. He’s a jackass. We don’t owe him anything.”

Hunk shrugs. “Okay.” 

“Thank you so much,” Pidge replies, nodding gratefully at Keith. “Your name is Inigo, right? Inigo Montoya?” 

Keith blinks. “What? No. My name is Keith.” 

Okay, so not everything in the dream is going according to the plot of the film. But that’s fine. She can work with that.  If anything, she can speed up the Fire Swamp sequence.

Pidge stands and starts moving towards Lance. Her legs are wobbly and sore from the ropes, but she quickly picks up speed and breaks into a run. 

“Where are you going?!” shouts Hunk. 

“Don’t worry about it!” 

When she reaches Lance, she yanks him up and ignores his yelp of surprise as she tugs him towards the edge of the cliff and pushes him over the edge.

“I KNOW YOU’RE WESTLEY! AND I’M COMING AFTER YOU!” 

* * *

They’re both covered in leaves and mud and bruised all over by the time they roll to the bottom of the hill, and even though Pidge knows that this Lance isn’t exactly  _ her  _ Lance, she can’t help but press a giddy kiss to his lips and let him wrap his arms around her before she gets back to business and continues to move the story along.

“I missed this,” Lance murmurs into her ear. 

She smiles and nestles into the crook of his neck. “Me too.” 

And then he pulls back. “Wait. Why did you push me over the edge?” 

“Oh. Sorry, I had to. I had to make the plot move faster.” 

“The plot?”

Pidge sighs and points to a cave entry in the distance. The moment is clearly over, which means  it’s time to get back to moving things along. 

“The fire swamp, it’s that way, right?”

“Yes, but, how—” 

“Don’t ask me how I know. Let’s just go. Lotor is going to catch us at the end of the tunnel and I’d really like to get past the whole ginormous rat and quicksand scene as soon as possible so let’s get moving.”

“Lotor? Who is that?”

“Ugh.  _ Prince Humperdinck.”  _

* * *

Lotor catches them, of course, and unlike the others in the dream, he clearly has a sense of what his role in the narrative is supposed to be.

Because does all the nasty little things that his counterpart in the actual film is supposed to do, including sending Lance off to be tortured and forcing Pidge into a long, drawn out wedding ceremony with an officiant who pronounces marriage as mawwiage. 

Pidge isn’t surprised. She’s expected it all along, but she resents how theatrical Lotor is about it all. 

He insists on completing every scene, drawing every line of dialogue out as long as he possibly can until she feels like screaming. 

Luckily, Shiro, Keith, and Hunk come bursting in halfway through the wedding and whisk her away to Miracle Max’s, where Lance is recovering from the torture machine.

* * *

On the way to Miracle Max’s, Hunk turns to Pidge and regards her very seriously.

“Just to warn you, Miracle Max can be a little...kooky.”

“Kooky how?” she asks, eyebrows raised.

Hunk turns to Shiro, who considers.

“Kooky like an uncle who tells weird stories at family parties.”

“But harmless,” adds Keith.

Pidge nods. She has a pretty good idea who it's going to be. And if it is who she thinks it is…

“Does Miracle Max have like a niece or something too?”

Hunk’s eyes widen. “Yes. But almost nobody knows about her. How did you find out?”

“Same way I knew your names,” says Pidge, grinning.

* * *

Pidge has to hold back her smile when Coran and Allura greet her at the door and introduce themselves as Miracle Max and Valerie.

“My lady! So glad to see you here. I have some good news for you. It just so happens that your friend here is only mostly dead. There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive.”

Pidge nods and follows him inside.

Despite the fact that she know this is all some sort of crazy dream, the sight of Lance lying pale and lifeless on the bed inside Coran’s hut makes Pidge’s heart stop and her knees buckle.

She strokes his cold cheek and hopes she never has to see him like this in real life. 

She looks up at Coran.

“The power of love will save him, right? My love,” she says, her voice trembling more than she intends.  _ It’s just a dream _ , she reminds herself.  _ Just a dream. _

Coran nods. “You are a very bright young woman. Much like my niece Valerie,” he adds, gesturing at Allura, who winks at her.  

“Just a tick, Pidge,” Allura says, smiling. “Everything will be back to normal soon.” 

* * *

 

As it turns out, when he comes back to life, Lance is far more concerned with staying by Pidge’s side and making sure that she’s okay than he is with getting revenge on Prince Humperdinck, so it’s Keith who ends up storming the castle again and bringing him down.

In the end, Keith is crowned king (much to his dismay), while Shiro and Hunk decide to stay on as royal advisors. Pidge and Lance stay for the coronation with plans to travel the world together once the festivities end.

All the while, Pidge wonders when she’s finally going to get the chance to go back home. As fun as it all is, she wants to return to the castle, to her friends, to her Lion...and to  _ her  _ Lance.

So she decides to try and tell this Lance the truth.

* * *

At sunset after the final celebration ends, Pidge and Lance walk toward the royal stables, hand in hand.

She clears her throat nervously as they approach the gate. 

“Lan— I mean Westley?”

“Yes, my love?” 

“Have you ever felt like you’re meant to be somewhere else?” 

“What do you mean?”

“Like...like this is just temporary. Like your whole life is a dream.”

“I’m not sure I follow, but go on.”

“What I mean to say is that I’m not supposed to be here.”

“Well yes...that’s why we are at the royal stables, isn’t it? We are going to leave this place and travel the world together.” 

Pidge sighs and looks away. “No, you don’t understand. That’s not what I mean.”

Lance cups her cheek and gently turns her back to face him. 

“Then help me understand. I will always be here for you. Always.” 

Her cheeks flame as Lance leans closer, meeting his gaze. As he dips his head and their lips touch, the edges of her vision start to darken, and suddenly— everything fades to black.

* * *

 

Lance’s voice echoes through the darkness.

“Hey, you’re up!”  

Pidge opens her eyes and blinks, disoriented. 

She’s back. She’s home— she feels better than before— and she’s with Lance.

But she can’t trust anything or anyone. For all she knows, this might still be a fever dream.

“.....Lance?” she tests, crossing her fingers under the blankets.

_ Please recognize your name. Pleaseee recognize your name. _

“Yeah babe?”

_ Thank god.  _

“What time is it?”

“It’s morning. How are you feeling?”

“I’m okay, I think. I had the craziest dream. We were all in The Princess Bride.”

Lance stares. “What do you mean we were  _ in  _ The Princess Bride? Like we were the characters?”

“Yes. I was Buttercup, you were Westley.”

“No kidding. Was everyone else there as well?” 

“Yeah. Everyone, even Lotor.”

“That  _ is  _ a crazy dream,” Lance responds, smiling before his lips quickly twist into a frown and he presses a hand to his head. “Ugh.”

Pidge touches his forehead. It’s as hot as a summer day in Orlando. “Lance…”

He looks at her with a wry grin. “I’m glad you’re feeling better, but I think you gave me your cold. Think we can trade places and I can wrap myself into your blanket burrito while you get me some of Hunk’s magical soup?”

Pidge laughs and presses a kiss to his cheek. 

“As you wish.” 


End file.
